Decades upon decades of Tennessee football dominance of Kentucky removed any sense of "rivalry" from the long-running border series between the Volunteers and the Wildcats.
Yet as Mark Stoops and No. 18 Kentucky (6-2, 4-2 SEC) prepare to play host to first-year Tennessee head man Josh Heupel and the Volunteers (4-4, 2-3 SEC), both fan bases have reason to be heavily invested in Saturday night's outcome.
For UK backers, losing to Tennessee in football leads to a dark place — and the Big Blue Nation has spent a lot of time in pitch blackness.
My life began in 1964. In all that time, Kentucky has defeated Tennessee in football eight times.
However, having beaten Tennessee in 2017 and 2020, UK has split the last four with UT. On Saturday night, the Cats will look to vanquish the Vols in back-to-back seasons for the first time since 1976 and 1977.
So hope is back for the Big Blue vs. the Big Orange.
Meanwhile, beating UK has become the most important task of the 2021 Tennessee season.
UT has already lost this season to Alabama and Florida. Not even the most ardent Volunteers supporter gives Tennessee much shot vs. No. 1 Georgia on Nov. 13.
Given that UT has now lost 15 straight to Alabama, 15 of 16 to Florida and nine of 11 to Georgia, the Volunteers are in desperate search of a "rivalry game" they can win.
So Tennessee backers have turned their lonely eyes northward.
A post about defeating Kentucky on the VolNation.com football message board initiated on Oct. 9 — almost a full month before UT was to play UK — went on for 15 pages.
In a recent article, veteran Knoxville News Sentinel columnist John Adams noted that when your team has beaten a foe in 33 of the past 36 meetings — which UT has done against UK — your fan base reflexively expects to win that game.
"Most Tennessee fans wouldn't feel threatened by the Wildcats if Bill Belichick were their coach," Adams wrote.
Actually, Tennessee backers should feel a heavy stake in the Vols continuing their head-to-head mastery over the Cats because other relevant metrics reflecting the relative strengths of the two programs recently are not as convivial to UT.
Consider:
— Since 2006, Kentucky has played in 10 bowls and won six.
Tennessee has played in eight bowls and won five.
— Since 2007, Kentucky has had seven losing seasons.
Tennessee has had eight losing seasons.
— Since 2007, Kentucky has four victories over teams ranked in the AP's top 10.
Over the same time frame, Tennessee has no victories over teams ranked in the AP's top 10 (UT's last win over a top-10 foe came on Oct. 7, 2006, a 51-33 victory over No. 10 Georgia).
— Since 2016, Kentucky has gone 43-28 overall, 24-24 in Southeastern Conference games.
Tennessee has gone 33-35, 16-31 in Southeastern Conference games.
— Since 2019, Kentucky has had 13 players selected in the NFL Draft; Tennessee has had four.
From the UK perspective, the head-to-head results vs. UT are a lagging indicator that belie an overall shift in program strength that has favored Kentucky.
From the UT perspective, the fact that the head-to-head outcomes vs. UK have mostly continued to favor the Volunteers reflects an enduring truth: That Tennessee just "has Kentucky's number."
This week, UT will come to Lexington off an open date.
Heupel's installation of the up-tempo offensive attack for which he is known has gotten off to a quick start in Knoxville.
Tennessee ranks 13th in the FBS in rushing (226.1 yards a game); 17th in scoring (37.4 points a game) and 21st in total offense (457.2 yards a game).
The UT season turned for the better with the insertion of former Virginia Tech quarterback Hendon Hooker as the Tennessee starter.
Kentucky has history against both Heupel and Hooker.
When Heupel was offensive coordinator at Missouri in 2016 and 2017, UK went 2-0 vs. the Tigers. However, Heupel's offense, directed by quarterback Drew Lock, put 568 yards of offense up against the Cats in a 40-34 Kentucky victory in 2017.
Hooker threw for two touchdowns vs. UK in the 2019 Belk Bowl, but the Wildcats rallied to beat Virginia Tech 37-30.
A Kentucky victory Saturday night would allow Stoops to join Blanton Collier (five) and Fran Curci (three) as the only Wildcats head men since World War II with as many as three victories over Tennessee.
The Cats will enter the contest off their worst performance of the season.
Asked Monday at his weekly news conference at Kroger Field if he saw anything he liked on video from UK's 31-17 loss at Mississippi State, Stoops said "not very much."
It will be interesting to see if Kentucky loses confidence as a result of being throttled by Mike Leach and crew or whether the Wildcats come back angry and with a point to prove.
What we do know: For the Big Blue Nation, a victory over the Rocky Toppers in what is again starting to feel like a rivalry would make all the angst left over from a dreary night in Starkville disappear.
